Government urged to embrace refurbished IT

Repairs firm Comtek asks for channel support in latest green IT campaign

On the pile: Extending the life of hardware would help cut waste, claims Comtek

IT repair firm Comtek is calling on the government to lead by example on green IT by agreeing to overhaul its hardware refresh policy.

The company wants the government to commit to extending the life of the hardware used within its departments by at least three years.

Askar Sheibani, chief executive of Comtek, said: “There is a stigma attached to the IT repair industry, which puts people off making use of its services. But it is greener, more cost-effective and less wasteful to repair computer equipment than it is to replace it.”

Sheibani hopes getting the government to adopt a more resourceful attitude to the way it uses IT would, in turn, encourage private sector firms to do the same.

“We want the government to lead by example on this by increasing the lifespan of the hardware it uses by three years or more,” he said.

Comtek announced earlier this year that it was lobbying the government to abolish VAT on IT repairs to promote the growth of the repair industry.

The latest campaign is an extension of this project and is something Comtek is very keen to garner support from the channel on, added Sheibani.

“We have informed the government about this, but we are not making much headway on our own,” he said. “We need to put more pressure on them to take this seriously by getting as many people from the channel and the general public behind this as possible.”